Common Sense eCommerce

I got a spam in my email from PricePlay, which was really only a press release. I am beginning to look at press releases as spam. PricePlay, as near as I can tell, is a site where you select goods and then play an interactive game. The better you get at the game, the lower your price for that item gets (or something like that). I guess the idea is that your buyer sticks around for awhile playing a game.

First of all, a company that has to resort to spamming me with their press release gets knocked down a rung on the ‘legitimacy ladder’ to begin with. Secondly, this site is a bit confusing and I suspect that buyers might be suspicious of something they don’t fully understand.

I decided to give it whirl. The sign-up itself was suspect. I did not even put in a real email address and it let me get away with it! I played a Grand Prix game which I lost miserably because I could not get back to game instructions. Then I played a ‘whack a mole’ game which wasted even more time. With each mole whack, the price on my item was dropping.

I am not sure what the seller gets from this. There is a “Visit Sellers Website” button showing which you can use to go to their site.

If you get really good at the game, I suppose you get the item free? I couldn’t say; I didn’t have that much time to spend.

Tags: Strange Business Models, Odd Web Businesses, Press Release Spam

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